Inside-out Skeleton
Inside-out skeleton beckons, then speaks:
A dry rasp of sanity reaching for decency,
Reaching for something not known but needed.
“These bones are shivering, hard and too long-
All jutting angles and crossed lines, and
This skin stretched thin rips
With each shudder and readjustment,
Crumbles with each heaving of a sigh.
Don’t let it all fall away;
I’m not ready to bare my soul just yet,
But I need something to hold me in,
So stretch it.
Stretch it thin,
Shake it,
Make it rattle, dry and cold:
This is the last of my toughened skin
So make of it something stronger to hold
All those things that
I’ve been told I need,
Make of it something sacred-
A vessel, a cup, a heart or womb-
Make something I can keep with me.
Too many moronic voices
Idiot vices
Blind aces held in slippery fingers,
And I want to scream,
Just make the sanity in me go away.
‘Can’t stand it,’ I shudder.
‘Can’t do this
Won’t do this
Why must I do this all again?’
I shiver,
And
Rip the skin.
These bones are turning to stone, and
In the shadows, cool and dry,
I struggle to find just one ray of light
To warm me.
Damn the things that need flesh
The things that need to be held -
Damn them for making me shiver so, clinging
To this last bit of cover against the cold.
Damn this ache in me for decency and secrecy -
I cannot banish it;
It is now too much a part of me.
Damn it all.
If I could stretch it,
Stretch it all
Into some cloak to fit me,
Some bag to hold me in again -
If I could wrap this all tight around me,
Cover the bones again -
If I could bear the burden of flesh
Just one more time, I think
I’d find that ray of light
And dance
And dance
And succumb to the fire.”
Inside-out skeleton turns, and,
Crumbling, sifting, sinks down into the shadows,
Silent and stretched too thin,
Shuddering and reaching for
Something
Sacred
To hold her in.
Yes, both drawing and poem are my own creations.
2 comments:
Very nice. Is that pastel? I like the colors, shading, highlights, etc. You're particularly good with those things. BTW, is she wearing a kimono?!
Thank you very much! :D
I used a combination of marker (for the background and outline) and watercolor colored pencils, some watered, some not.
And, yes, that's a kimono- good catch! I'm nto so great yet at drawing fabric, so played of one of the drawings in my incredibly freaking awesome anatomy/shading/form book, Cyclopedia Anatomicae: More than 1,500 illustrations of the human and animal figure for the artist. Which, amazingly, I got for ten bucks, new, at Barnes and Noble. The thing's gott be worth well over $100, easy, just for the increidble amount of extremely detailed drawings in it. It's how I learned to draw skulls properly.
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